I recently had my DNA tested at AncestryDNA.com and learned that I am 73% English-Welsh-Northwestern European (Norman French), 14% Scotch and Irish, and 9% German. No surprises there, although I expected the German percentage to be higher.

Because I am not registered at Ancestry’s website I have been able to use their extensive database to build a family tree. The one above is a “pedigree” tree, showing my direct ancestors but not collateral lines. The names Greider, Tichenor, McClure, Pierce and Pangburn appear, as expected, but also some names not previously known. I have names, dates and some other information about my eight great grandparents and the names of 14 of my 16 great great grandparents. Each name which shows a tiny green leaf can be opened to show additional connections in that line.

I invite you to take a look at the information at Ancestry. To open the ethnicity material, click on the link Nancy’s Ethnicity. The migration information shown there is a generalization, and some of our family history tells a somewhat different story. We have no recent immigrants — perhaps two in my great grandparents generation. With so many generations in this country, ethnic mixing must be expected. I don’t know where the Swedish percentage came from!

To open my tree, click on the link Pedigree Tree. You should be able to open the profiles and links for those for whom a green leaf is shown. At the top of the screen, click on Trees to see two other trees. The one called William Henry Greider has been set up to include my father’s siblings, but I entereed only partial information. It has been created so that cousins from that side of the family can link to it. The tree called Bradbury-Greider was posted by Karen Bradbury, whose great great grandfather, Benjamin Greider, was also my great grandfather. In other words, we are second half-cousins twice removed (I think).

Nancy Eleanor Greider [Gluck], February 2019

Advertisements

August 18, 2012 at 1:59 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on

Above you see William Henry Greider and Emily Tichenor Greider and their children. We at the Greider Clan are descendants (and in-laws) of that family. Here we post pictures and documents from the family archives and tell our stories. Find us at Who We Are and The Greider-Tichenor Nexus.

Frank and Gertrude McClure with three grandchildren and their dog Chinkie — at the farm in western Pennsylvania, c. 1940

Frank Storer McClure (1870-1947) and Gertrude Pierce McClure (1874-1961) were my grandparents. They lived and worked on a farm they owned in western Pennsylvania, in the west bend of the Monongahela River near the hamlet of Bunola.

During the years of the 1930’s and 1940’s, my parents, brothers and I visited them regularly, usually spending two weeks at the farm in the summer. Frank and Gertrude were growing older at that time, but I had little sense of that. All adults were old, and grandparents were especially old.

Now, reading their letters of that period — and having achieved a few years myself — I understand them better.

My brothers and I told each other a story about our parents’ engagement and marriage in which the villain of the tale was my grandmother, Gertrude Pierce McClure. My father, Harold Greider, a worthy young chemist at the Mellon Institute in Pittsburgh, met my mother, Gladys McClure, who was a student at the University of Pittsburgh. After her graduation in 1922, she went back to live at the McClure farm while teaching home economics at Monongahela High School. Harold bought a Model T and traveled regularly to the farm to see Gladys. Liking became love and they became engaged, in December 1923. His parents, William Henry Greider and Emily Tichenor Greider, drove all the way from Kansas to meet the prospective bride in the summer of 1924. They approved. Then Gertrude raised holy hell and objected to Gladys marrying anybody. Daunted by this, she signed on to teach for another year, 1924-1925. At that time married female teachers were immediately discharged. Harold and Gladys couldn’t stand to wait any longer, however, so they married secretly in November 1924 and kept it to themselves until 1925, when Gladys finished the school year. Gertrude was furious, Harold’s parents were tolerantly amused, and my grandfather, Frank McClure, was not heard from. The young couple settled in Plymouth Meeting, near Philadelphia, and in 1926 my older brother, David, was born.

Thus begins my account of the marriage between my parents, a matter kept secret for over half a year. Why did two conventional people do this? Is anyone to blame? Fortunately we have letters from the period which help to explain it all.

Over the years I have posted a number of documents and pictures related to the Greider family. Now I have assembled some of them into a book — 101 pages, sprial bound, soft covers — and added many more pictures and captions. This compilation includes:

From Dawn to Dusk – the complete text with additional pictures and notes.

Topeka 1912 – the photographs Harold William Greider took in Topeka in 1912.

My Father’s Model T – the story of a Model T car and a 1920’s courtship.

Letters from Mother – the letters Emily Tichenor Greider wrote to her son, 1924-1930.

Cousins and Forebears – a road trip to family sites in Kansas.

Click on this link to see a pdf of the book. I have sent printed copies to relatives for whom I have addresses. If you would like a copy, please contact me by a comment here or by email to greiderclan at gmail.

I have now completed transcribing the final chapters of the life story of my grandfather, William Henry Greider. He entitled his memoir “From Dawn to Dusk” and told how a poor boy from a farm in Indiana acquired an education and a respectable — and respected — life as a teacher in early 20th century Kansas.

In “The Doctor” he relates how he obtained a medical degree and then had the adventure of his life, serving with the army in France during World War I.

He ends with a few general reflections about the world and his times and his own expectations.

Grandfather Greider always speaks of himself in the third person, trying to maintain a detachment from his adventures and from his very real progress toward the good life. His modestly does not completely conceal his pride, however, and I like him for that.

The earnest young man third from the left in the back row is William Henry Greider, my grandfather. As “W.H.G.” he writes about his pursuit of education in late 19th century Kansas and his career as a school teacher. He may be shorter and less polished than the other members of this college debating society, but he makes up for it with concentrated effort and a pugnacious attitude. Click here to read his story.

Here you see my very respectable grandfather, William Henry Greider, in his career as a school teacher. In the next chapter of his life story, “From Dawn to Dusk,” he remembers his earlier brief career as Willie Sawdust, a California factory worker. He tells us that he triumphed over violence and ignorance. Click here to read all about it.

Bill worked on the farm of Ira Dickinson [ Section 29] near Manchester, Kansas, and eventually married the girl next door.

As my grandfather continues to tell his life’s story, he changes his name to indicate his growing maturity. He works hard, learns much and chooses his lifelong vocation. Click here for From Dawn to Dusk: Bill.

My mother, Gladys Elizabeth McClure, was born in Forward Township in Pennsylvania and grew up on one of the McClure farms there. In an earlier post, Our Uncle Cicero, I told the story of her family, going back to the first immigrant ancestors — McClures, Pangburns, and Fitz Randolphs — and their relationship to the land in Forward Township. Recently my brother Bill and I revisited that Monongahela River country, the wooded hills, and the farmland we knew so well as children.

The Frank McClure farmhouse today. That may not be the original porch swing, but we always enjoyed a swing in that location.

We saw where our mother’s people lived and also where they rest today.

West Bend Cemetery, Forward Township, Pennsylvania

Mostly the news is good. The hills retain their beauty and many of the farms are now being preserved. Click here for a history and an update to history.